Buttermilk, Beetroot and Apple Muffins

I saw some gorgeous muffins over at the Great Big Vegetable Challenge and was immediately intrigued. Charlotte, who has completed an A-Z of vegetables with her son Freddie has now moved on to healthy packed lunches for her children. Freddie is still marking dishes out of 10 and these muffins gained a massive 9 out of 10! That is recommendation enough for me.

I have converted Charlotte's recipe into cups, but it is essentially still Charlotte's recipe. I made no changes except for the buttermilk. I didn't have any, so I made some with milk and a tbsp of lemon juice, filled up to the quantity and then left for a few minutes to develop, as it were.

Preheat the oven to 180C. If you are using a deep muffin tray, cut out six squares of baking parchment 15 cms by 15 cms. Line each muffin tin with a square of paper. You can use paper cases if you prefer. Melt the butter, allow to cool slightly and in a bowl stir in the sugar, beaten egg and buttermilk. Mix well. Add the finely diced cooked beetroot and diced apple and spoon of maple syrup. Sieve the flour and baking powder and roughly stir in so the flour is distributed but don’t over mix. Spoon the mixture evenly into each lined muffin tin. Mix together the ingredients for the topping and sprinkle evenly over the top of each muffin. Cook in the oven for 30 minutes.

Makes six large muffins or 12 smaller ones

We really enjoyed these muffins, but we both preferred the beetroot in these muffins, when they were still warm. I have since tried these without the beetroot and they are still great. I used the same recipe, but added more blueberries and some cinnamon to the muffins.

I am entering these muffins into Ruth's Kitchen Experiments. Ruth holds an event every Monday called Bookmarked Recipes .....where you can blog about a recipe you have bookmarked from a cook book, food magazine, food blog, food website or from TV and then make it and submit it to her weekly roundup.

Oh, I nearly forgot! I sprinkled these muffins with Angie's sugar topping. The most gorgeously aromatic sugar mix (another kind gift). I will post the recipe, once I have checked all the ingredients. Angie did tell me, but I was too busy sticking my nose in the tub and breathing deeply, to pay attention.

brownies with beetroot and muffins with beetroot...who would have thunk it? But the more I think about it, the more it makes sense...beetroot is dense and sugary and mashes well. i'm not much of a cook, but i am a baker, and you've got me inspired...

These came out fantastically! Pink muffins and the family looked at me like I was nuts but they really loved them. Followed the recipe exactly however added some cinnamon in the main muffin mix as well!! Thank you!!

I love reading comments, so thank you for taking the time to leave one. Unfortunately, I'm bombarded with spam, so I've turned on comment moderation. I'll publish your comments as soon as I can and respond to them. Don't panic, they will disappear when you hit publish. Jac x